Restaurant talk: La Paisanita in Bishop Arts

Wow! A new taquería in Oak Cliff. Like, how original. It’s just what we wanted.

OK. Now that I have the sarcasm out of my system, let me say, there are worse things to have in the Bishop Arts District than La Paisanita. The restaurant at West Davis and Adams is the second Paisanita in north Oak Cliff. The other one is at West Davis and Ravinia. But the new one is different.

This restaurant in a renovated former laundromat is not just a taco stand, like the Paisanita farther down on West Davis, where you order at the counter and wait for someone to hand you tacos in a plastic basket or paper bag.

At the Paisanita on Adams, you can order takeout, or you can sit at a table or booth and order from the small, simple menu — tacos, gorditas, tortas, breakfast plates. Dine in, and a waiter will bring a basket of thick chips, served with a warm habanero salsa, which makes a thin sweat break out over my scalp. It makes me sniffle. It’s so good.

From left to right: Chicken, pastor, fajita

I ordered three tacos — one chicken, one fajita, one pastor. (Three tacos and a can of Diet Coke cost about $5.50.) Surprisingly, the chicken was my favorite. A long time ago, when I worked in a law firm, this lady used to sell homemade chicken tamales in the office sometimes, and some people suspected they were actually made of pork because the chicken was so delicious. That’s how these chicken tacos are. I’m not saying chicken should pose as pork, but there are worse things chicken could do.